Twitter Ads: No Harm, No #Fail

Only 11 percent of Twitter users get annoyed by Promoted Tweets, according to a new study by market research firm Lab42. And 25 percent of the study participants said they had seen Promoted Tweets from brands that were relevant to them.

Chicago-based Lab42 surveyed 500 Twitter users in August to arrive at the data. Twenty-two percent of them said they have discovered a discount offer via a Promoted Tweet, while 14 percent said they had retweeted a Promoted Tweet. Four percent didn’t know what a Promoted Tweet was.

Eleven percent claimed that following brands on Twitter was the leading reason for using the micro-blogging site. Nearly 50 percent said they follow between one and 10 brands, and 11 percent said they don’t follow any.

Here’s maybe the most surprising statistic from the report: 8 percent stated that they follow a whopping 50 or more brands on Twitter.

Relatively speaking, the findings appear to be good news for Twitter, which reportedly plans on running ads in users’ tweet streams for brands whether the viewer follows them or not. Promoted Tweets were launched in April 2010, and were first available as part of search results. For the past six weeks, brands have been able to target their followers with the microblogging ads.

Update: This story previously stated that Promoted Tweets had targeted followers since April 2010.